by Robert Ryshke, Executive Director

This was a good interview with Deborah Gist, the Commission of Elementary and Secondary Education in Rhode Island. She discusses what Rhode Island is doing to rollout their new Teacher Evaluation model. Gradual rollout before full implementation has been important, as well as involving teachers in the process.

She doesn’t discuss this in her interview, but much of what I have read about teacher evaluations systems around the country is that teachers need to know that principals and other evaluators are well trained, understand the system they are using really well, and are confident of the work. Principals and evaluators need to work hard to establish a culture of TRUST and TRANSPARENCY.

Read the interview with Ms. Gist at the attachment below. I have highlighted some key elements from the interview that were important to me.

ACEES works to ensure that all members of the education community are deeply engaged in the development and implementation of the Rhode Island Model for educator evaluation. ACEES acts in an advisory capacity to provide us with:

eedback on key evaluation system deliverables; and

direction for overall system development through the design principles.

An effective evaluation system is key to developing, supporting and improving the effectiveness of our educators as well as recognizing the outstanding performance of our most effective teachers and leaders.

During gradual implementation, teachers have set only two Student Learning Objectives and one Professional Growth Goal, and they will have only two classroom observations (one long, one short). Under full implementation, teachers will set up to four Student Learning Objectives and at least three Professional Growth Goals, and will have at least four observations.

In Rhode Island, as part of our commitment to multiple measures, our system includes multiple observations of practice over a period of time, as well as other evidence of professional practice,

Evaluations are a cultural change for some districts, and they are a challenge for all of us because we have to work really hard to ensure that our evaluations are fair, transparent and useful to educators.

Communication is the key, beginning with involving teachers in the development and design process. Last year, as we were designing the evaluation system, I met with teachers in every district in the state to discuss with them face to face their ideas and concerns about evaluations.